vidextreme

Looks like a bubble algae. Don't worry, this type of algae is less aggressive(doesn't spread) and is actually aesthetically nice for the tank.

I think that's a bit uncalled for, don't you think? Anyway, happy reefing!

You can add... Establish a good natural nutrient transport/absorbing system. - introduce easy to harvest and acceptable aesthetically looking algae to compete with the nuisance algae. This can also include mangrove and other plants. - use clams (or oysters, I tried that in my old system, though I heard they are good in consuming nitrates but also too much calcium).

Just an important note when fragging or 'trimming' zoanthids... pls pls plssss handle with care. Not for the zoas sake, but for your own. Zoanthids, not sure if all or some, contains one of the most toxic substance! Here's an important read... http://www.bluezooaquatics.com/resources.asp?show=16

Hmmm... not sure where you have gotten your numbers considering like you said, not much information on garlic. Maybe info for aquarium feeding but general info is more than sufficient. Taken from wikipedia... "When crushed, Allium sativum yields allicin, an antibiotic[79] and antifungal compound (phytoncide) discovered by Chester J. Cavallito and colleagues in 1944. Fresh or crushed garlic also affords the sulfur-containing compounds alliin, ajoene, diallyl polysulfides, vinyldithiins, S-allylcysteine, and enzymes, B vitamins, proteins, minerals, saponins, flavonoids, and Maillard reaction products, which are not sulfur-containing compounds. Furthermore, a phytoalexin (allixin) was found, a nonsulfur compound with a γ-pyrone skeleton structure with antioxidant effects, antimicrobial effects,[80] antitumor promoting effects,[81] inhibition of aflatoxin B2 DNA binding,[81] and neurotrophic effects. Allixin showed an antitumor promoting effect in vivo, inhibiting skin tumor formation by TPA and DMBA initiated mice.[81] Analogs of this compound have exhibited antitumor promoting effects in in vitro experimental conditions. So allixin and/or its analogs may be useful compounds for cancer prevention." Thanks however on the info on Aegis, worth reading on the future tech on aquaria feeding. However, it really proves the point that the best solution in safe guard our precious water breathing pets is to improve and maintain their health. The best, in my 2cent worth opinion, against ich or any infestation compare to quite harmful implication and risk with chemical solutions. My personal experience with pellet that contains garlic, has drived and kept ich tank-overtaking at bay for 5+ years now since last incident (with different fish). This, I only say, for what it's worth, of course.

I'm not too sure NSW will be safer. But it make sense that sudden water parameter changes AND composition may shock or stress the living stuff in the tank. But I agree sudden water changes have some effect on microorganisms in tank and in the bio filter media as well.

Hi bro, I didn't soak pellets with garlic. I just fed pellet that comes with garlic already. And I did try to dose garlic into tank directly, didn't work.

I tried hyposalinity and and slightly Copper though half way through the treatment, I read about the danger of copper when exposed to certain metals becomes toxic so I stopped. Btw, dosing garlic doesn't work, at least I tried that as well. But with food infused with garlic, worked like a charm. The reason why I still would recommend garlic in pellets is its the only treatment I know of that has no detrimental effect with other fish, critters, especially corals. Copper dosing has to be done properly, otherwise I heard some horror stories with it. So no, I still prefer the o' natural garlic.

Unfortunately, based from what I read and personally experienced, once tank is infected, rocks, sand, and fish most likely will carry over to renovated or even to new tank. The solution to ich is not really hard to find actually. Forget about dosing something to tank or chemical dips, those things will work only up to a certain extent. The solution is building up your fish's health and immune system. And the magical ingredient is, what our mothers or grand parents taught us. Garlic! I've tried everything I could find as the 'recommended solution' for ich, none works except when I tried to feed my fish food that includes garlic in their ingredient. Works so magically, signs of ich decreasing over night after first feeding. Though, every once in a while when a fish gets a bit under the weather, 1 or 2 ich latch on it, but don't last long. It shows two things. One, garlic still works. Two, unfortunately, ich still present in tank. And even to fish I migrated to 2 different tanks gets it every once in a while.

Good parameters, just what I expected. My guess is ammonia is just present due to residue of prawn. But with the 0 nitrite, that means nitrite eating bacteria is established by now. Do a continuous dose of Microbacter7 and drop a bit of Reef Fuel this time. And I would dare guess by tomorrow or the next day ammonia would be zero. Do you get bubbles when you plow the sand? When ammonia is zero, you can introduce fish now. One or two should be a good start. But if you want to add more live rocks, you might hold on putting the fish at least allow the nutrients and decomposing stuff on the rock to be handled by the tank. You can also introduce your clean up crew (hermit crab and snails) as you add rocks. You don't have to wait for nitrate to be zero. I read an article regarding this (forgot to book mark it) which disputes the idea that the cycle of a tank includes the nitrate zero due to it's unpredictable pattern. That article even goes on to say that complete cycling actually includes the maturity of a complete tank(with fish, corals, etc) and nitrate being stable to low is only attained, without any special means, not less than 2 years. This means cycling a tank to prepare to accept bio load, stops and means ready when nitrite is zero. Some reefers easy to conclude that stagnant growth of corals are due to elevated nitrate, which I do not agree and this article does not too. More about this in due time. (done too much ranting hehehe) In short this article is saying, ignore nitrate and be done with it. For now, glad to be of help. Please update us on your progress.

Hi bro, I noticed you are using Synthetic Vinegar. To be honest, I have no prior experience with dosing vinegar to my tank. But just curious, if it makes any difference to use natural vinegar instead? Since synthetic vinegar is most likely acetic acid, would it be safer to use the naturally fermented rice/sugar cane vinegar? Any thoughts on this?

Bro, try Brightwell Potassion comes in powder and liquid form. http://brightwellaquatics.com/products/potassiont.php http://brightwellaquatics.com/products/potassionp.php Contains potassium chloride and potassium sulfate

How old is you tank? Typically what I do when nitrate is high, I just don't feed the tank. I then replace my carbon source (plastic pellets) and/or dose Reef Fuel and bacteria dose. That way I try to lower nitrate naturally at first. If it persists, then I feed the tank drastically less than before. No, frozen fish unless fish can finish it all. I also dose iron supplement to induce cheatos growth so they absorb the nitrate faster as they flourish. If still doesn't change, which seldom happens, that's the time I'll consider water change. But small portions only. The 2+ inch sand band btw, well, it's really an estimate. This is dependent on the size of sand granules and/or composition. Yes, let it settle down first. Never give up. We're here for you bro!

I like the natural light look (personally don't like tank too blue). Here...take my "Like" I actually like the algae build-up in the middle. Makes the tank look more natural. Good job bro!

Sorry, bro. Don't give up, though. You can look at this as an opportunity to reset and make it better. I don't think it's caused by the vinegar (btw, I'm just curious.. did you use the artificial acetic acid vinegar or natural distilled vinegar? Though no point at this time, but it could be a useful insight. ) It's most likely a hydrogen sulfide poisoning. By it's name, yes hydrogen sulfide and it's sulfur brothers such as sulfur dioxide are toxic. I'm totally against siphoning the tank's substrate and rather use snails or starfish to sift the tank for me. The reason being is, first, sand beds are NOT producing nitrate out of thin air(or water) and don't really require cleaning(at least for saltwater tank). If we got some elevated nitrate level, it only means we fed the tank more than we should or our bio load had exceeded our bio filtration capacity or something recently died and decomposed in the tank and not because our sand bed is evil and needed to be cleansed by our holy siphon tube . Hydrogen sulfide and sulfur dioxide are released naturally if our sand bed is healthy. Typically, these sulfur gas/metal are trapped 2+ inches below the sand where there is low oxygen availability. This is due to decaying matter being trapped there in that anaerobic environment where sulfur bacteria decomposed it. Natural sand sifters will slowly release this trapped gas or metal form that's how nature works. And that's why I don't eat snails and sea cucumbers, because I know exactly why they are 'delicious' . Siphoning the substrate however will have a greater chance of trapping more organic stuff that we don't want, because the more we trap the more sulfur gas has to be released. Concurrently, by siphoning, we release and exposed too much of this sulfur stuff. Which can cause critters/fish death and might be the cause of your tank crashing. Btw, hydrogen sulfide is even poisonous to us humans. This is why people who knows this will discourage tank being placed in a low ventilated area. For us here in Singapore, it's a bit hard to do, considering most tanks are in an airconditioned room. The solution is opening the window regularly and let the natural air comes it... good for us humans too!

That's good you have BioHome Plus and Seachem Denitrate in the canister, that's exactly my previous setup was. It never failed me. How many trays does your canister filter have? I would advise your bio filtration stuff must be on the tray that you most seldom disturb. That being said, the carbon and purigen would be best to be placed on the upper trays for easy access. The reason why Reef Fuel or any carbon source is said to over flow skimmers is because your jump starting the bacteria colonies. Some bacteria will generate film and these will cause skimmer to go crazy. But no need to worry, it's part of the tank balancing itself. You might hold off dosing it if you still have a cloudy tank at the end of the day (just as I suspected, because of this dreaded prawn technique). First off, lose the prawn. You might try to reduce the dosage of Microbacter up until the cloudiness clears. If it doesn't clear at the end of the day. Check for ammonia. Try to sniff the tank. If you smell an earthy scent, that's good. If you don't smell anything that's good too. If you smell rotten eggs smell, that's still good (that's hydrogen sulfide/sulfur dioxide coming from the sulfur cycle which is under-rated by most reefers) but don't sniff it again, not because it smells bad but because it's toxic...not kidding, here . If you smell just something plain o' rotten, then that's the time to panic. Panic... means the tank needs a closer observation. Cloudiness of tank must not last (or at least should drastically reduced) more that 2 days. If it does...unfortunately, tank might need to restart, or at least need a drastic water change. To check if your good bacteria are working, take a stick and slowly plow a small section of your sand bed. If you see medium to large amount of bubbles, that's very good. That's a mixture of sulfur gas and nitrogen. That means, the nitrogen cycle bacteria are in place and they are working hard to balance your tank. I know that's a bit too much, but that's the bad and good thing about saltwater compare to fresh water... Freshwater tank is easy to start but high maintenance. Saltwater is hard to start but low maintenance if you got it right. In my experience, I don't even water change. Perfect for my laziness nature . (Thought to do this, it'll require a different approach than those who WC).

I almost forgot... welcome to the saltwater world! If you are using live rocks, there's no need to use dead prawns, the biological stuff in the LR will be enough. But I can see you're in the right track by dosing the good bacteria. May I know what's your current biological media? I hope they're not bio balls. Some may argue, but I go against them not because they're bad but rather too small in it's bio load capacity compare to more porous media (Bacteria King, BioHome, etc) Diatoms are normal in the first few days of tank. So don't worry. Typically, they will show on rocks and sand... then those on rocks will disappear... then those on the sand. They will reappear every once in a while with phosphate, silicate, and nitrate spikes Regarding nuance algae, well that surprise is still ahead of you (even on my tanks), but diligence and patience is key to prevent this. About the aiptasia, don't just stand there and kill the buggers! (I hate them so much, sorry for the outburst) Back to the dead prawn technique, the reason why I'm against this approach it's because it's an old technology and frankly obsolete. Before bacteria dosing was available, the only way to drive the cycle is to add something decaying in the tank and pray that the good bacteria dominates your tank and seed themselves on your media. But with all of the awesome progress with bio filtration technology, like Microbacter7 and the likes, there's no need for this old approach. Drastic increase of ammonia(coming from decaying stuff) may even back fire and even slowdown tank's cycle. You can ask around with some of fellow reefers here what's their experience with adding prawn(of course some maybe good, but there's a chance to be bad). Some will remember an early bacteria bloom and clouds the tank which some may argue is safe, but I don't think the same can be said by living organisms and nice critters on the live rock that you might want to retain. Just something to think about, living a dead fish to decay with a tank that cannot handle the bio load (like early cycle tanks), what happens? In my experience, I kick started a few tanks already and cycling can be done within a week using purely dosing bacteria and LR. IMO, you can remove the prawn and keep on dosing bacteria. You might consider dosing carbon source (Reef Fuel if your confident with Brightwell), but my advise you do this slowly. Btw bro, you have the perfect substrate. And your lights are no less than awesome!

According to wikipedia, it contains some trace elements, magnesium sulfate, potassium chloride, and sodium chloride. I'm not sure if it includes phosphate or silicate, but most probably contains nitrates (one can confirm). Just on the safe side, you might use distilled water instead.

My 2 cents.... I personally do not agree with this. I used it before but two things you need to do using canister filters for saltwater tank. First, don't use the canister filter as your mechanical filtration but a dedicated biological filtration compartment (BioHome, Arag-rocks, etc). The reason for this is, you don't want to disturb the seeded bacteria every time you want to change the filter media. To achieve this and secondly, you need to add either a small overflow box where you can place your mechanical filter media (filter mesh, etc) or have a pre-filter canister before it goes to the bio-dedicated canister filter. Btw, overflow can also help you skim the surface of the tank which in saltwater typically has a oily-film floating (though you can fix this by adding more water movement).

Depending on the concentration. But I prefer using kalk water as my top-up rather than using it to maintain pH. I find the pH it increases last only a short while. It happens when this solution gets exposed to carbon dioxide, you get Ca+ plus handful of electrons that increases your pH. And that's good but happens too quickly. In order to maintain pH and calcium availability with kalk, reefers has to resort concentrated-kalk to drip system. Comparing this to the two part (A+B Calcium Chloride + carbonate, bicarbonate salt)... What's good about the two parts is that calcium chloride decomposes much slower than kalk as it gets exposed with the carbonate solution. Another good thing about this is solidified calcium chloride (I forgot the precipitated compound of this, sorry) would decompose back to useful Ca+ over time. What's bad about this is you need to do it once or twice a week as opposed to the drip system (which is setup and forget). Both have good and the not so good on them. Which is why I chose both. Dose once or twice per week with two parts, and top-up with diluted kalkwasser. I didn't answer your question straightly but I hope you find this useful. Btw, you need the availability of magnesium to your tank in order to prevent precipitation of Ca+ too fast thus maintaining your pH better.

Hi, I'm not really sure what you meant by 'dusty powder' rock. But I'm pretty sure nitrates are only produced in the tank due to the end part of the nitrogen cycle. Yes, I'm of those reefers that don't believe in the 'nitrogen factory' concept at least how it's generally understood. If you get a spike in your nitrate reading, it's either test kit is spoiled or something died then decayed but nitrogen cycle proponents are working except for the anaerobic nitrate-to-nitrogen that somewhat slower. Other than that, there is no such thing as bio-balls or DSBs producing nitrate out of thin air(or saltwater ) That being said, any detritus or decaying matter must be removed from tank before it even extracts ammonia, that's the overflow, bottom of fuge, etc. However, bioballs, LR, biological filter media how ever must not be disturbed as it can reset the seeded good bacteria. I would definitely use BioHome media and the likes instead of bioballs. Or you could just really on LR if you find it's porous enough. Never ever clean them once established. I prefer dosing vodka instead as it's not as acidic as vinegar as a carbon source. Better yet, use plastic pellet based carbon source is safer and more consistent on dosing. I would suggest not doing this at the early cycling of the tank.

It sounds like ich infestation. I accidentally introduced this to my established tank with a fish with small white dots and it has caused almost all fish death due to ich. I had tried every solution I could find in the internet, isolation dip, copper dose, high and low salinity technique, dosing liquid garlic, dip pellets with garlic, etc... The only solution that worked with my is feeding the fish that has garlic in it. After I did...magic, the infestation was under control over night! Though every now and then you can see one or two spot on some of my tank fish, but they don't last long. They say that ich once in your tank, they don't totally go away. In my opinion, acclimating the fish is somewhat overrated. I only worried about temperature differences but that's it. Plus follow the 10-day-rule, don't name your fish within 10 days and grow attached to it, otherwise you'll be sad hahhaha.

I think you can consider slowly dosing Iron supplements if cheatos not growing. But dose it with small amount first as it would enhance the growth of any algae in the tank or refugium. I suggest 2 brands I know of... Microbe-Lift Chelated Iron and Brightwell Ferrion. As a bonus this also are said to enhance coral colours.

Last week ago, Aquamarin has some.

Maybe it prefers something fresher... like guppies alive a few seconds ago. Try to brush the feed to it's snout repeatedly. I must admit, it takes the eel a bit of training before it gets used to the feeding habit. Just be patient, it slowly becomes easier to train as it becomes hungrier when not eating.